British minister resigns over immigration furore

Britain's embattled Immigration minister Beverley Hughes has resigned after an uproar over the handling of visa applications from EU candidate countries in eastern Europe.

Ms Hughes stepped down after it was alleged that immigration officers, grappling with a backlog of visa applications, had rubber-stamped bids to move to Britain from citizens of EU enlargement countries.

Prime Minister Tony Blair said Ms Hughes quit because she felt that answers she had given in media interviews earlier this week were "not consistent" with what she would be telling an investigation into the claims.

"I think she's behaved with integrity in coming forward immediately to me and saying, 'This is what I think I should do'," Mr Blair said at his monthly Downing Street press conference.

Mr Blair said he would be taking a "close interest" in politically sensitive immigration issues, but stressed that there was "no question" of him taking personal charge of them.

"We need to deal with it because otherwise it becomes a real source of tension and misunderstanding within our own community here in this country," he said.

Des Browne, a minister of state at the Department for Work and Pensions, was named to replace Ms Hughes as Immigration minister.

Ms Hughes, 54, had been Immigration minister since 2002 under Home Secretary David Blunkett, and was seen as a future senior cabinet minister.

Prior to Thursday, she insisted -- as did Mr Blunkett -- that she would not bow to calls from the main opposition Conservative party to resign.

"I am neither incompetent nor dishonest," she had said earlier this week.

On Tuesday, as the row escalated, the government announced it was suspending all visa applications from Bulgaria and Romania, which are in line to join the European Union later this decade.

Coincidentally, the civil servant whose revelations unleashed the furore was appearing before a Home Office disciplinary hearing on Thursday.

Steve Moxon was to be quizzed over his disclosure to a British newspaper that key checks were being waived for visa applicants from the eight eastern European countries due to join the EU on May 1.

Mr Moxon was suspended from his post at the Sheffield office of the Immigration and Nationality Directorate after he exposed details of the scheme, codenamed Operation Brace.

Mr Blair conceded that swift action needed to be taken "if there has been systematic fraud".

However he said that isolated cases of abuse "should not colour the whole of the immigration picture".

Immigration from eastern Europe has become a political hot potato in Britain, with mass-market tabloids running alarmist stories about a looming influx of migrants who supposedly will rip off the nation's welfare system.

Mr Blair's government rejects such fears, but it has set restrictions on workers coming from the new EU member states in eastern Europe, though not those from Cyprus and Malta.

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